Jaqueline Cedar

Region: Northeast

Website: http://www.jaquelinecedar.com

City / State: Brooklyn, NY

My paintings depict life-size figures interacting amidst abstract fields of shape and color. Unsure of their surroundings, these figures make rote attempts to interact with one another both physically and psychologically as their gestures are echoed and amplified by their environment. They have strong inclinations toward action, yet limited mobility. They find themselves absorbed by their own thoughts and yet compelled to engage with their surroundings. They are filled with a sense of impending doom, and still uncertain of their purpose. As these figures acknowledge the absurdity of their circumstances, they respond distinctly with behaviors that reflect their will and needs.

The paintings address such issues as self-awareness, control, and immobility, staging a potential but arrested movement toward knowledge or engagement. By arranging figures as armatures for hanging line and color, my paintings construct scenarios in which subjects behave both as backdrops and participants, observers and actors. Adjacent structures of shape and value at once form and collapse, advancing an overall sensation of motion, depth, and atmosphere.